Epicurus and the Garden

Epicurus (341–270 BCE), born on Samos to Athenian parents, founded a school in Athens around 306 BCE in a garden outside the city walls, and his followers became known as 'the Garden'. Unusually, he admitted women and enslaved people as students, and the community lived together in friendship, sharing simple meals. Epicurus taught that the goal of life is pleasure, understood mainly as freedom from bodily pain (aponia) and mental disturbance (ataraxia).

He based this ethics on Democritus' atomism: the universe consists of atoms and void, the gods do not interfere, and the soul is made of atoms that disperse at death. Removing fear of the gods and of death, he believed, would bring peace of mind. Epicurus wrote around 300 works, of which only three letters and collections of sayings survive in full. His school continued for centuries and spread throughout the Roman world.